Old Wives Club
by OzGeek
Summary: McGee is kidnapped by a group of his fans. Not one for season 4 deniers. All done, going on holidays.
1. Chapter 1

McGee wondered whether all local halls were designed and built at the exactly the same instant by the precisely the same builder. A by product of his round of talks to writer's groups was a tour of such identical establishments, each with worn wooden floors and a raised wooden stage adorned with musty, heavy burgundy drapes. The smells of the two media intertwined to trigger that part of the memory exclusively reversed for the word 'old'.

The walls were a testimony to the hall's standing in the community: plaques for ballroom dancing, school awards, posters for amateur theatre plays, and flyers advertising sporting clubs or baby playgroups. The chairs were universal: coloured plastic seats with metal frames and feet designed to screech along the floor at exactly the right frequency to resonant some nerve residing in the rear of his jaw.

Then there were the people. He felt it his duty to give back to other writers, paying his dues for when they had supported him before his work became know. Besides, his agent thought it was a good idea. He no longer wore the turtle neck sweater or the jacket with elbow patches or even carried the pipe, but it was not unheard of to meet such people on these little visits.

His eyes scanned the current group of about fifteen women. The name they had devised for themselves: 'The young ladies writer's group', was a bit of a misnomer. He judged the youngest to be in her seventies. The oldest, bordering on three hundred, made Mrs Mallard look like an 'America's Next Top model' contestant. The name tags reflected the era of their births: Dot, Vera, Irene and Lucy (whose thick Polish accent rendered her almost incomprehensible), all names of his grandmother's time. In fact, it looked like someone had been cloning his grandmother and got it all terribly wrong. But they had all read his book and readers, even readers who would not live to buy the sequel, were important to him now. 'He' for the purpose of this exercise, was 'Thom'; as proclaimed by his name badge.

"We all just loved the bit where the young man captured himself a young lady and trained her to be a good wife," Dot enthused.

McGee blinked, "excuse me?"

"Where he chained them in a room to teach them about the proper way to act," another added. "So few of today's young women know how to treat a man properly."

McGee smothered the smile that crept across his lips as he envisaged what Ziva, Abby or even Kate for that matter, would say to these women.

"Ah, ma'am," he started, carefully so as not to offend, "he was a little, ah, insane."

"But his heart was in the right place," smiled Dot, patting his hand.

McGee's polite smile froze. He decided to let it go. Chances were they wouldn't remember any of this in the morning anyway.

He stole a look at his watch and was shocked to find it was after 11 pm. He thought old people went to bed early.

"Well, ah, it's been nice talking to all of you….ah… 'young ladies' ," he began tactfully, "but it's getting very late and I have work in the morning."

"My heavens, yes!" the one labelled Irene agreed suddenly. "My goodness, Vera we have to get going."

A group of four rose and approached. He steeled himself.

"It's been lovely to meet you dear," said the first, bending slightly and giving him a peck on the cheek. Even though he was sitting, they seemed almost the same height.

This was the part he hated; when everyone had to say their farewell personally. The first four each took their piece of him and huddled out the door. He could hear strains of "what a lovely young man," echoing through the hall.

He smiled nervously at the others, hoping against hope they would take the hint and set him free.

"Tea dear?" Vera asked him directly.

The old ladies around him were rising and stacking chairs. He leapt to his feet to help relieve them of their burdens.

"Ah, no thanks," he muttered apologetically.

"Oh we always have tea at the end of a meeting," she scolded.

His eyes flitted around the cloudy sea of expectant cataracts. "Ahhh, OK, sure."

Two rounds of tea later and he was finally in his car and on his way. He reflected that he really should have looked for a bathroom before his escape but for now he would hang on. He flicked the 'home' icon on the Sat Nav with the back of his fingernail and the comforting array of GPS satellite signals lit up the tiny screen.

"Let's go home," he said, thankfully settling back into his seat.

* * *

The clear, peaceful late night roads made the trip a pleasant one. The hall was a long way out of town and he was certain the streets were fairly deserted by day, let alone during the absolute solitude found late on a work night. He noted just one car parked up ahead. As he drew nearer he saw her standing by the car waving her hand uncertainly, her rear tire characteristically deflated. The trunk was already open in anticipation of help. He was never one to shirk a damsel in distress.

As he pulled up alongside and wound down the window, she smiled apologetically: "Could you ring the auto club? I don't have a cell phone."

McGee cut the engine and smiled. "It's just a flat, ma'am, I can have you on your way in ten minutes."

"That's very gentlemanly of you," she beamed, "The spare's in the trunk."

He peered into the dimly lit interior of the trunk, straining his eyes to figure out where the carpet lifted to reveal the spare. Pain exploded inside his head and he pitched forward into the cavity.

"Pump up the tire, Dot," the crackly voice reverberated in the darkness, "I'll phone Vera to tell her we got him."


	2. The problem with fans

McGee awoke to the sensation of being invaded by a pungent odour. It had already conquered his nasal cavities and was on route to a hostile takeover bid for his cranial sinuses. He gasped reflexively, sucking in a great mouthful of the stuff. Coughing only dragged in more. His head spun with effort – what was that smell? Then, somewhere in his mind, he heard Abby's voice in full lecture mode: 'Naphthalene, the primary ingredient of mothballs.'

One mystery solved, but now the back of his head was throbbing; now the front. Then he heard the whisper of croaky voices.

"What did you hit him with, Lucy?"

"Just my brick, the one I keep in my handbag."

"Well, it's left quite a lump, and look at the one on the front."

"That's not my fault; I hit him on the back of the head. That's from where he hit the floor of the trunk."

"Ohh, look at his hair when it's ruffled like that, isn't he adorable?"

McGee's eyes flew open and small hunched figures scattered to the sanctuary of the shadows like vermin, trailing naphthalene fumes in their wake. He could hear them all twittering away in the twilight just beyond the scope of the merge light that surrounded him.

He was lying on his back on a large wrought iron bed. He deeply regretted not taking the time to visit the bathroom before he left the community hall. There was something on his body; a blanket of some kind. His mind searched through the archives: it was a crochet blanket made from individual squares. He remembered his grandmother making one with her friends; everyone contributing a square and the whole set being sewn together to form a blanket. It brought a little smile of familiarity to his lips.

He moved his limbs experimentally and found his right arm was sporting a brand new heavy metal bracelet. He tugged a little and heard the scrape of metal across a wooden floor. Rolling gently to the side, he could just make out a chain running from his arm to a loop of metal protruding from the floorboards.

"Oh, you'll never get out of that," an elderly female voice from the dark assured him, "That nice man from the hardware store set it in concrete."

"Greg, wasn't it?"

"Yes, Greg: lovely boy."

McGee frowned momentarily, trying to judge if this was some post car-accident traumatic event. It seemed real enough, in a surreal kind of way.

The lady he knew as Vera materialised from the shadows.

"Where are we?" His mouth stumbled over the words. That must have been a pretty hard hit to the head. He resolved to put a bit more effort into the next question.

"Somewhere no one will find you," Vera said in a reassuring tone, completely at odds with the actual content of her speech.

"Oh, ah, OK." His words were clearer but now his brain had gone off-topic.

"I suppose you're wondering why you're here." She smiled the sincere smile of the certifiably insane.

"Well, yes, kind of." Bingo, brain and mouth back in synch.

"Well, we all got together and decided that you were the perfect gentleman."

"Ah….thanks, I guess," he replied warily. Now he was sure he was back to normal, he was beginning to have reservations about the other party in the conversation.

"Many of us have been widows for a very long time," Vera explained in her best mad-scientist-exposing-the-plot voice. "The men of our age group are usually only looking for a house keeper or live in nurse and the young men of today are just not interested in the experiences an older woman can offer. Have you ever had a relationship with an older woman, Timothy?"

"Ahhh, yes…" He wondered how much Abby would appreciate being counted among their number.

There was a cackle of laughter from the old crones and in the half light where they cowered, McGee could see rows of inch thick glasses and startlingly white, artificially straight teeth hovering in midair. He began to think he had been kidnapped by a gang of renegade hyperopic Cheshire cats.

Then something struck him; "How did you know my real name?"

"We're not stupid," a voice croaked from the shadows, "we took your wallet."

A sense of unease began to descend on McGee. He felt around surreptiously for his cell.

"Oh we tossed the cell," Vera assured him. "We're old but we're not completely unfamiliar with new technology."

"We're not old." He knew that voice, the polish accent of Lucy again. "We're just chronological over-achievers."

McGee sighed carefully so as not to inflame the pain in his head. He didn't want to hurt them but they were starting to look a tad dangerous.

"So we took your idea from the book and captured ourselves a man," Vera continued; "a virile young man without the need of blue pills."

"Mind you, we have those in case you need them," called a voice from the dark.

"Yes, thank you Dot."

"Where's my car?"

"Oh Irene took it for a spin. You should have seen her on a horse in her younger days, such a daredevil. It broke her heart when they took her driver's licence away."

McGee gulped: his car, this was getting serious. He carefully swivelled his body around to sit on the edge of the bed causing the crocheted blanket to slither to the floor. The movement made him distinctly ill and he paused to let the feeling of imminent purging subside. It would have been easier if there hadn't been an all pervading stench of rotting meat from somewhere in the room.

From an upright angle, things made a lot more sense. The chain was connected to a metal ring set in a concrete block that protruded through the floorboards. He must remember to thank 'Greg' sometime. There was a yellow circular line marked out in paint on the floor. A quick inspection of the length of the chain confirmed his suspicions: the radius was defined by how far he could reach. They were outside the circle, in the 'safety zone'.

Within his territory there was a bed, a hand basin, a toilet with a small paper screen for modesty and even a rudimentary shower – just a spout sticking out of the wall: obviously a voyeuristic point for them. There were no windows but he could see two doors: one an exit, one a cupboard, both beyond his reach.

"You can't really mean this," he appealed to Vera.

"Just wait until you're our age, and you'll see," she was deadly serious.

"But I could hurt you, kill you. I'm a trained agent."

"Oh, you wouldn't do that," she smiled ominously. "You're a gentleman."

He opened his mouth to retort before realising she was right.

"Think about it," Vera invited, "what is the worst they can do: give us life? Five whole years: now there's a deterrent. Besides, if you take anyone of us down, you'll never see the rest of us again. There's no food here and it's very nicely soundproofed."

"Ah the soundproofing, Greg was so handy," reminisced one of the voices from the dark.

"Yes dear, he was," Vera confirmed.

"Well, Timothy, it's getting late. You had better get some sleep. You have a lot of 'servicing' to do tomorrow."

McGee's mouth moved up and down a little but he could not think of anything to say. Despite his rising panic, the throbbing in his head was fast becoming the dominant focus of his energies. Finally he came out with: "Do you have any asprin?"

Vera laughed, "Asprin? Oh my no. It interferes with blood pressure medication."

"It makes me constipated," offered another.

"Me too," quipped another, "but fortunately you lot give me the…"

"Girls!" Vera cut in. From her handbag she took out a strip of pills and popped two onto her hand. "Try these, they'll help."

McGee did not hesitate. He strode to Vera's outstretched hand, swiped the pills and threw them down his throat in one gulp. He toyed briefly with the idea of grabbing her but right now he needed pain relief, bladder relief and some sleep. He would deal with everything else in the morning. He heard them all filing out the little door but did not look back. Maybe by tomorrow, whatever nursing home they had escaped from would adjust their medication and he would be free.

He lay on the bed to think. There must be an easy way out. The last thing he needed was for the rest of NCIS to find him like this: kidnapped by a gang of old ladies. Even his editor would dismiss this situation as too unrealistic. His head was still booming away full throttle. The claws of his mind scrabbled desperately against the slippery walls of consciousness and he realised something he probably should have thought of a whole lot sooner: he had just taken random tablets from his kidnappers. Yep, no one was going to believe this one. The world spun into darkness.


	3. Sav Nav for dummies

"Where's McGee?" Abby demanded.

Tony's head shot up from his desk where it has been resting. Another marathon night of 'classic' French films had taken its toll.

"What, who?"

"McGee," Ziva prompted.

"Who?"

"McGee," Abby repeated forcefully. "He promised to tweak my new firewall, the connection is really crappy. Gibbs!" Her attention veered abruptly to track Gibbs from the elevator to his desk. "What did you do with McGee? He promised to help me this morning."

Gibbs raised a questioning eyebrow at Tony who replied with a shrug. Gibbs frowned and opened his mouth to speak.

"And yes: I tried his cell and yes: I tried his home and yes: I rang his sister," Abby interjected without pausing for breath.

Gibbs shut his mouth again and resumed frowning.

"I'll trace his cell," Abby announced bouncing to McGee's desk.

Gibbs followed her mouthing the question 'how many caf-pow?' in Tony's direction. Tony shrugged in a manner indicative of fear of the unknown.

Abby already had the trace on the plasma screen by the time Gibbs reached her side.

"That's strange," she breathed quietly, "It's in the middle of nowhere."

"Put out a BOLO on his.."

"No need boss," Tony cut in, "his car has already been reported abandoned outside a retirement village. Pretty bashed up too, by the look of it."

"Oh..oh…oh," Abby's hand shot straight in the air. Gibbs nodded for her to proceed. She smiled smugly and pronounced: "Something's happened to his grandmother and he hasn't had time to call."

"And what, his grandmother threw his cell out the window because he did all the rally driving?" Tony queried.

"And he didn't tell any of this to his sister?" Gibbs pointed out.

Abby pouted in disappointment. "Ok, probably not."

Gibbs swung into action. "Ziva: the phone, Tony: the car. I'll take the retirement village. Move it."

The three agents ran for the elevator leaving Abby starkly alone in the middle of the squad room calling tearfully: "Can I do anything? Gibbs? Anyone?"

A single tear meandered down her cheek, before she pulled herself together and headed for the lab.

* * *

Abby did not have to wait long for her minions to return showering her with forensic gifts: McGee's cell phone and the Sat Nav from his car. Treasures in hand, she skipped through the lab with her little entourage in tow murmuring seductively to the electronic equipment: "Comm'on guys, tell momma where her baby is."

"OK," she announced to the awaiting throng minutes later, "his Sat Nav was on a route to home from this community hall here." She pointed to a dot on the plasma screen map. "Now the Sat Nav can show us his actual route, as well as the planned route. She hit another button on the screen and a mass of lines criss-crossed the screen."

"Thanks that's really useful, Abs." Ahh, Gibbs sarcasm.

The three agents rose as one to leave.

"And…." they froze as if competing in the world musical statues final, "if I run it with the time stamp on."

They settled again.

She hit the keyboard and a new map appeared on the plasma. The three agents watched as the signal left the community center and stopped a short time later.

"And that," exclaimed Abby triumphantly, "is where the cell phone was found."

"What happened then?" asked Gibbs squinting at the screen. "That's not where the car was found."

"This." Abby hit the play button. The signal stayed perfectly still as the time stamp clicked over. And kept staying. And stayed some more.

"Can we move this along a bit before he dies of old age?"

"Oh sorry."

Abby hit the keyboard again and the timestamp fast forwarded.

"Whoa! Look at that thing go!"

They watched in amazement as the signal scooted around the screen coming to rest an hour later outside the retirement village.

"One of the residents called it in this morning," Gibbs confirmed. "No one heard anything: they sleep with their hearing aids out."

"So what's with the community hall?" asked Tony.

"Aha!" cried Abby. "While you guys were out Special Agenting, I was checking out McGee's date book. McGee was doing a writer's thingy thingamabob there last night."

"Any contact number?"

"Yeah, but no one's answering"

"Good work, Abbs," Gibbs muttered heading for the door with Tony and Ziva on his tail, "we'll be at that hall."

* * *

From the outside, the community hall looked like any one of the million or so abandoned warehouses they had explored over the years. With a few notable exceptions: the cars parked outside.

Gibbs flicked out his cell, "Abbs, get me a licence check on some plates…"

The three agents circled the small wooden structure. It was suspiciously empty. There was no noise, no signs of life but a test of the front door revealed it to be unlocked. Gibbs nodded and the three agents entered silently, stalking around the vacant hall.

It was Ziva who noticed it first: a small wooden trap door in the middle of the stage. There was light seeping through the edges and a strong smell of something she couldn't quite place. It reminded her of the word 'old'.


	4. The cavalry cometh

McGee drowsily attempted to shift position in his sleep and was annoyed to find he couldn't move. He tried again with more force; nothing. Then his head chimed in with a reminder that it had been the subject of some fairly decent bashing recently and he groaned. The smells came back: naphthalene and off meat. His mind poked about in the fog trying to remember what it all meant.

"See, told you he'd be fine."

He eyes sprung open of their own accord and he immediately clamped them shut against the harsh light. Slowly, he opened them to slits.

"I told Vera two sleeping tablets would be too much," Lucy confided to him from her rocking chair; her knitting needles clacking manically in his ear.

He realised she was close; too close. In fact, she was inside his circle. He focussed all his energy on the one action: leap up and overpower her, but the instant he tried the manoeuvre he came to another realisation: he was chained by all four limbs to the bed. A quick scan of his body confirmed the hypothesis. Moreover he had been stripped naked and was covered in that crocheted blanket again. Not a great thing to overlook.

Lucy looked down at him in a kindly, psychotic grandmotherly way and he suddenly empathised with Little Red Riding Hood in a manner he never imagined.

"Ready for a little loving?"

The voice was behind him. He spun his head and immediately wished he hadn't as his eyes rattled in his head. When they reached equilibrium, he focused on the figure: it was Vera, looking more like a crazed sadistic loon than he last remembered.

Slowly he became aware of an audience of old ladies sitting on rows of coloured plastic chairs. There was some muffled chatter, some laugher, some were even munching popcorn.

"Um…I might need to use the…" then he paused. Why didn't he need to go to the bathroom?

"Oh Irene gave you a catheter," Vera explained with a menacing grin that probably started life as a sweet, reassuring smile. "She used to be a nurse, you know."

McGee was surprised at the sense of relief this information provided. Forget the horrific images of being stripped naked and having a catheter inserted by demented old ladies while unconscious; if Irene was back, then logically his car should be alright. He sought out Irene in the crowd to thank her.

"Sorry about the car." His heart sank.

"Now to business," said Vera briskly, "blue pills or not blue pills? I'll be your first assignment and then Irene and Dot. Then we've scheduled tea at 11 and then you can make your way through the pre-lunch crowd."

McGee stared at her in horror. This was much worse than he remembered. There was a callous, pragmatic tone to the whole proceedings that he could not get his brain to accept.

Vera approached him with a glass of water in her hand and a huge open mouthed grin on her face. Then she stuck her finger in her mouth, clicked out the top row of her dentures and dropped them in the water with a plonk. Panicking, McGee strained powerlessly against his bonds as she flipped her finger over and repeated the action with the bottom set. The audience started warming up with whoops and cheers.

Suddenly, there was the sound of creaking boards overhead and the crowd went silent. Before he could cry out, Lucy had skewered the ball of yarn with her knitting needles, stuffed the conglomerate in his mouth and bound the woolly gag with the world's longest hanky. McGee froze as the points of the knitting needles danced precariously about his eyeballs.

"Lu-thy wa-th a th-py during the war," Vera lisped quietly.

McGee's eyebrows arranged themselves to suggest he had figured out something like that all by himself.

The little group stood listening to the boards groaning and whining in submarine-grade silence steadfastly ignoring McGee's frantic writhing and whimpering.

The creaking stopped and everyone held their breath. Then a little hatch opened above the main group and McGee was astounded to see every single old lady pull a gun from her clothing or handbag.

"Can't be too careful nowadays," Lucy whispered in her low guttural tone. "There are a lot of crazy people out there."

McGee found himself staring incredulous at her before his agent senses kicked in. He had to warn whoever was overhead that there was a room full of homicidal, geriatric, sexaholics ready to shoot anyone who entered the room.

It was over in moments. Ziva jumped through the trap door with gun blazing. The lightweight granny guns jumped around the room like fleas. Tony followed, rolling on the floor and taking up a stance at her back scanning around the room. Gibbs hung through the overhead door with his gun trained on Vera.

"Let him go," he said menacingly.

Vera sighed, defeated and put down her gun. Seeing the others followed suit, Gibbs swung down athletically, his gun and attention still focused on Vera who was restoring her teeth to their rightful place.

"DiNozzo: round them up, Ziva: get the handcuffs."

Ziva went straight for Vera and gave her the roughest pat down of her life. Wordlessly she held the keys aloft.

Tony herded the others into a small group in one corner of the room, barely managing to keep from laughing at the calibre of McGee's nemeses.

"Be nice' Tony," Ziva called out undoing a cuff on McGee's hand. "Think how you would feel if Ducky's mother had you strapped to a bed." She gave McGee a consoling look.

"Victoria? You people know Victoria Mallard?"

McGee rolled his eyes. Why was he not surprised they knew Ducky's mother? In this company, Mrs Mallard was probably known as 'Victoria the sane'.

"Wait," gasped a voice from the group: "you must be Tommy and Lisa!"

Ziva froze as she hovered over McGee, her face metamorphosing from an expression of sympathy to one of pure rage.

"Do your own damn handcuffs," she spat throwing the keys just out of reach of McGee's free hand.

But the little writer's group had long forgotten the original reason for the agent's presence. They crowded around Tony and Ziva caressing them and asking pointed questions about their love life, while Tony and Ziva valiantly tried to remind them they were supposed to be under arrest.

"He certainly is swashbuckling."

"She's more attractive than she sounds in the book."

"Oh my, then that one must be…." they chorused together in awe: "L.J. Tibbs!"

The scrum surged its way from Tony and Ziva to Gibbs. McGee threw his head back on the bed in horror. He never thought he would long to be alone with the crazy old ladies.

Vera, lagging back from the others, whispered conspiratorially to Tony: "L.J. is very handsome, are those really his teeth?"

Tony gave her a puzzled look. "Sure," he assured her, "he has the receipt to prove it."

Gibbs put up his hand to quiet the lively throng. "What's that smell?"

As his newly acquired fan club watched, he sniffed his way around the room before settling on the cupboard door. One pull of the handle and a badly decomposing body thumped on the floor. He raised a questioning eyebrow at Vera.

"Greg couldn't keep up the pace," she shrugged nonchalantly. "We had such high hopes for young Timothy."

McGee, still strapped to the bed and slowly paled to grey. Harmless they were not.

It took the combined efforts of the three agents and the local LEOs to round up the gang and lead them out to an uncertain fate.

"See what happens when you venture into the dark realms of the literary world, McGeek," Tony chastised removing the last of McGee's manacles. "You invite fanatical grannies into your life. Stick to TV and movies; much safer."

* * *

"McGee!" Abby launched herself at him as the elevator doors opened. She'd obviously staked herself just outside the doors. The others ducked out of the way as fast as they could.

McGee winced as his already battered skull made contact with the hard metal of the elevator's rear wall. Abby hadn't noticed; she had him in a grip which the term 'vice-like' didn't even begin to cover. The doors slid shut and they were alone. Abby moved her head from McGee's shoulder to stare intently into his eyes. Then, without warning, she kissed him full on the lips. McGee's eyes were still open wide in shock as she unlocked lips and dismounted.

"Don't ever do that again," she growled and Gibbs slapped him just as the elevator doors opened again.

* * *

"I have a special surprise for you," Jeanne whispered in her sultry voice.

"Not another guy sewing a ribbon through his nipple?"

Jeanne pouted that pout. " 'Manion de Source' is a beautiful French love story," she insisted.

Then she smiled again; "but, no this is an all American action thriller. I have preview tickets. Usually I give them to the younger boys but I thought after a hard week of French Classics you deserved a break."

Tony smiled at her in relief; he could certainly do with some good action stuff tonight.

Gazing deeply into her eye, he took the offered tickets gently and glanced at them. His world ground to a halt as he read the title.

"Deep Six: The movie."


End file.
